MOVIE REVIEWS: WRECK-IT RALPH

The reviews are overwhelmingly positive for the videogame-themed Wreck-It Ralph, something that will come as a welcome relief to the workforce at Disney Animation, who have had to endure years of negative comparisons with their corporate siblings at Pixar. Several critics complain that there’s much too much videogame-like running around and crashing in the movie, […]

IPHONE IS KILLING MOVIES, SAYS NY FILM CRITIC

In an opinion piece that appeared in the New York Post‘s Sunday edition, the newspaper’s film critic Kyle Smith made the case that the iPhone is quickly destroying the experience of going to the movies. Smith commented that until the advent of the device, “a trip to the movies … was just about the last […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: WON’T BACK DOWN

Won’t Back Down is sort of a Norma Rae in reverse. This time, it’s the union — a teachers’ union in Pittsburgh — that’s the villain, and your judgment of the film may very well be colored by the way you regard the performance of unions in general and teachers’ unions in particular. Even if […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: TROUBLE WITH THE CURVE

Trouble with the Curve isn’t a great Clint Eastwood flick, critics agree, but he certainly gives a more effective performance in it than he did at the Republican National Convention earlier this month, they say. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times calls it “a superior entertainment, moving down somewhat predictable paths with an authenticity and […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: DREDD 3D

Critics are assuring their readers that it’s OK to enter theaters showing Dredd 3D with low expectations — particularly if they already have seen the flop that Sylvester Stallone created out of the graphic-novel character. Indeed, comments Sean O’Connell in the Washington Post, the new Dredd “proves far superior to the corny misfire attempted by […]

REPUBLICANS USING OBAMA’S STUMP SPEECH TO ATTACK HIM

Until now, the stump speech has been a convenient tool of presidential candidates, allowing them to deliver virtually the same remarks at countless “whistle stops” all over the country. But in the day of streaming video, when a candidate’s remarks in every Podunk town can be viewed instantly online, a reassessment of the stump speech […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: 2016: BARACK OBAMA’S AMERICA

It was no match for Michael Moore’s anti-George Bush documentary Fahrenheit 9/11, but Dinesh D’Souza’s anti-Barack Obama documentary 2016: Obama’s America was surprisingly hot over the weekend. Widening to 1,091 theaters, it took in $6.51 million, amounting to $5,966 per theater. By contrast, The Expendables, the No. 1 film at the box office, averaged $4,024 […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: THE CAMPAIGN

Kyle Smith, the politically conservative film critic for the New York Post lets loose a torrent of zingers at The Campaign, starring Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis, concluding with the unkindest jibe of all: “Put it this way,” he writes, “Jimmy Carter was funnier than this movie.” He concludes: “My friends, I’ve seen some terrible […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: ICE AGE: CONTINENTAL DRIFT

Critics have given the fourth Ice Age movie, Continental Drift, a mostly cool-to-cold reception. Sean O’Connell in the Washington Post, however, suggests that viewers are likely to overlook its faults. “Logic [in the plot] may be extinct, but, boy, do these movies whiz by like ice cubes zipping across a linoleum floor.” Moreover, he writes, […]

MOVIE REVIEWS: ABRAHAM LINCOLN: VAMPIRE HUNTER

Possibly not since Snakes on a Plane has a movie come along that depended so much on its title to draw audiences as Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. “It’s too bad that the film’s concept is way more entertaining than what has ended up on-screen,” writes Kenneth Turan in the Los Angeles Times. That sentiment is […]

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